pmla-submission

Submission Preflight (pmla-submission)

The last check before submitting on PMLA's ScholarOne site (mc.manuscriptcentral.com/pmla). PMLA

is anonymous (blind), so the most common avoidable failure is a self-identifying manuscript — and

the most common eligibility failure is a non-member author. Verify volatile specifics on the official

page before relying on them.

When to trigger

• "Submitting tomorrow" — last pass before upload
• Unsure which files/metadata ScholarOne expects
• Confirming the word range is met and the manuscript is properly anonymized

Process facts (verify volatile items on the official page)

• Owner / publisher: Modern Language Association (MLA) / Cambridge University Press.
• Portal: PMLA's ScholarOne (mc.manuscriptcentral.com/pmla); submit a Word file.
• Eligibility: the author and all coauthors must be MLA members; the essay must be

unpublished (in any language) and not under consideration elsewhere; a revised version of a

previously submitted PMLA manuscript is not considered.

• Review model: anonymous (blind) — anonymize the manuscript; supply a separate cover sheet.

Each eligible article is sent to at least two reviewers; recommended articles go to the **PMLA

Editorial Board, which meets periodically with the editor to make final decisions (the Advisory

Committee reports on articles submitted). Until a final decision, the author's name is not made

known to readers, board members, or the editor**, and any reader/board member/editor with a possible

conflict recuses themselves.

• Venues: regular article (6,000–9,000 words); special features — Theories and Methodologies

and The Changing Profession (each limited to about 3,500 words, incl. discursive endnotes,

excl. translations and works cited), plus Criticism in Translation and Little-known Documents

(ongoing categories). Special-feature proposals carry a 15 October deadline and an **abstract

not exceeding 100 words** (待核实 — confirm on the live page).

• Word count: 6,000–9,000 words for articles; includes discursive notes; excludes the

list of works cited and translations.

• Fee / open access: no submission fee (verified 2026-06-22); any post-acceptance open-access

(APC) charges are handled by Cambridge — confirm the current figure on the live page.

• Decision rate / timeline: acceptance/desk-rejection rates and time-to-decision are **not stated

as fixed numbers** — treat as live-check (需复核).

• Style: MLA style per the most recent MLA Handbook (in-text + Works Cited).
• AI disclosure: fully cite, at submission, any content created by an AI tool.
• Abstract: not requested for regular articles; a 100-word abstract applies to special-feature

proposals (待核实 — confirm on the live page).

Preflight checklist

Venue & length

• [ ] Venue chosen; word range met (article 6,000–9,000; special feature ~3,500 — verify)
• [ ] Count includes discursive notes; excludes Works Cited and translations
• [ ] If a special-feature proposal: abstract ≤ 100 words and 15 October deadline observed (待核实)

Anonymity (blind review)

• [ ] No author name in the manuscript text or notes; acknowledgments removed
• [ ] References to your own prior work are in the third person, not first
• [ ] Identifying file metadata stripped; separate cover sheet (name, address, title) prepared

Eligibility & format

• [ ] Author and all coauthors are current MLA members
• [ ] Essay is unpublished and not under review elsewhere; not a resubmitted prior PMLA manuscript
• [ ] AI-generated content (if any) fully cited at submission
• [ ] MLA style per the current MLA Handbook; in-text ↔ Works Cited consistent (see pmla-citation-and-style)
• [ ] Quotations exact; translation policy applied; submitted as a Word file per ScholarOne

Anti-patterns

• Leaving author name, acknowledgments, or first-person self-references in the manuscript (breaks anonymity)
• Submitting without MLA membership for every author
• Sending a regular-article-length piece to a special feature (or vice versa)
• Resubmitting a previously declined PMLA manuscript as a "revision"
• Using a non-MLA citation style

Output format

【Venue】article / Theories & Methodologies / Changing Profession / Translation / Little-known Documents (range met? Y/N)
【Eligibility】all authors MLA members? unpublished? not under review elsewhere? [Y/N]
【Anonymized】no name/first-person self-ref; metadata clean; cover sheet ready? [Y/N]
【Word count】6,000–9,000 (notes counted; Works Cited/translations not)?
【MLA style + AI disclosure】[Y/N]
【Next】await decision → pmla-revision-and-response if asked to revise

Supplementary resources

• [../../resources/external_tools.md](../../resources/external_tools.md) — ScholarOne portal, MLA-style and anonymization tooling
• [../../resources/official-source-map.md](../../resources/official-source-map.md) — official PMLA URLs behind every fact in this pack